Chapter Text
AMERICANA - [noun]; things associated with the culture and history of America, especially the United States.
ALIEN - [noun]; a being from outer space; extraterrestrial
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Excerpt taken from: “Saturday Morning Livestream /come bake with me!” from user @Airi-chan✅
[The camera is angled into a massive kitchen, an aisle between two marble countertops allowing for access quickly between ovens and cabinets and white mixing bowls. Utsukushii Airi moves between them, flour smeared playfully but highly intentionally over her nose to make herself look cute and klutzy, just about entering the end stages of a baking recipe for chocolate chip cookies. Mixing with a wooden spoon and her bowl under her arm, she approaches the camera - which was also a computer - to read at the furiously scrolling chat feed. 46k people watching, and counting.
“Are you ever going to collab with Jack Maple again?” she reads. “I don’t know! He was only in Tokyo for a short while. He’s like, the coolest guy ever, so I hope so!”
The chat goes wild. A thousand more questions are asked.
“What recipe are you using…” she says, barely catching the question. “Oh!”
She dances back away, setting the bowl down and reaching to grab the sheet of paper that was carefully set aside to avoid it getting dirty, carrying it over to the camera. She holds it up, though the lighting turns the white paper reflective, and the words are hard to make out in neat, small printing. “Can you see? Screenshot it? Maybe?” she breaks off into a giggle and puts the recipe aside. “It was actually given to me by…. Uh, Satori,” she says, then corrects: “Tendou Satori. From Paranormality? He swears by this recipe, and I really need to impress my grandmother, so…”
She laughs again, watching the comments scroll up. “What’s Paranormality?” she reads, then: “It used to be the Ghost Captains? But people kept making fun of them because they weren’t captains anymore so they changed it,” she says, then reads: “Am I going to collab with them any time soon… oh I don’t know. Sawamura is so hard to convince to do anything collab-like, y’know? And Oikawa’s currently still abroad. Most of them are abroad these days it seems. But I’d love to! They’ve never invited me ghost hunting though. Can you believe it? I’d definitely go if they asked… Are they going to be at Icon next year? I have no idea, you’ll have to ask them.”
She laughs again.
“Why is my grandmother judging my cookies? Because she judges everything. She was literally a court judge.”
---
Excerpt taken from: “Firebug Challenge w/ Bo Kotaro” from channel @XtremeBbrad✅
[The camera operator seems to be having an active seizure as they zoom in and out of both subjects in some kind of outdoor set. There’s a doggy pool in the back, a row of green hedges, some random, scattered shit - a scooter, a bucket tipped over, a lawn hose.
The zoom in goes dramatic on the first man - shaved head dyed bright blue from a video only a few days before. Tattoos on his neck are too vague to identify the meaning of.
“Yo, welcome back Xtreme nation! My name’s Bradley, and I am joined once again by yet another banger guest for today's video, number eight-hundred and thirty of vlogging every day since moving to Japan!”
Camera out. Camera in. Camera out. Look at that dog!
“Everyone knows Paranormality, the absolute ghost-fucking freaks from across the internet that do sick things like-”
Camera out! The camera snaps over to the guest - Bokuto Kotaro. He’s dressed down - it’s a nice, warm spring day and he’d been told he’d be on camera, so that’s what he’s doing. He looks… baffled. Surprised. Confusion. Lost. One can almost see the social stimulation bar above his head close to reaching critical mass. He says nothing.
Bradley stares at him, before laughing and saying: “You’re a riot, man. In case you don’t know, because you’ve been, like, living under a rock or something for the last four years, Paranormality is a channel dedicated to ghosts, monster, folklore, and then some other shit, it’s like half ARG half history textbook, and hella scary sometimes. Bo here is one of the lead cast members, and is constantly getting himself into trouble, so we thought it suitable to cause just a little bit more with him. That’s why today we’ll be doing the firebug challenge. The firebug challenge is where you take a fried scorpion that’s been soaked in ghost pepper sauce and try to eat it in one bite! Are you ready, Bo?”
Bokuto breaks out into raucous laughter.
“What is happening?” he asks.]
---
Bokuto mentally checks “eat bug” off his list of things to do before he’s 100, and flicks his tongue slightly to try and get rid of the burning pepper aftertaste of the frankly disgusting edible item.
After some stupidity on camera, drinking milk and complaining and struggling to breathe, Bokuto is thankful to be saying goodbye to this weird, weird man. Bradley isn’t… bad per se, but though Bokuto had enthusiastically told Kenma he did want to accept the collaboration offer with the rather popular internet star, he had begun to realize why Daichi, Ushijima and Kuroo had all declined to do the same.
“Hey, it’s been real,” Bradley says, clapping Bokuto on the back as he walks him down the long driveway towards the street, where Kuroo had conveniently come to pick him up. “Quick question, I’ve been meaning to ask you all day… do you guys like plan out in advance what you’re going to do with your videos?”
“What do you mean?” Bokuto asks.
“Like… all that ghost stuff, is it scripted? Do you have a dedicated writer?”
“Oh, I don’t… think so,” Bo says. “Or if they are scripting it, they haven’t told me,” he adds.
“Haha, like the dog in that movie,” Bradley replies.
“Huh?”
“Am I going to be seeing you at Icon this year?”
“I don’t know,” Bokuto replies, waving his hand. “I need to leave, man…”
“Oh! Sorry, sorry, yes, go on-”
---
Excerpts taken from “Overnight in a Haunted Hotel in Paris!” from channel @Paranormality✅
[-the camera focuses on Daichi and Oikawa as they walk down a Paris street, the sun setting behind them and making the camera glare slightly difficult to see through. It takes Daichi a few minutes to adjust to figure it out, before he says:
“Alright, so we are on our way to l’hotel rubis right now. This hotel is apparently haunted by… how many ghosts?”
“So many ghosts,” Oikawa cuts in, leaning down to put their heads closer and fix the framing Daichi wasn’t paying attention to. “The most famous of which is this old mistress they call Anna, who died in sixteen-oh-two and apparently specifically haunts people who roam the hallways after ‘polite hours,’ so basically anything past eleven at night to, like, six am. She throws stuff, knocks on walls, she even scratches someone once.”
“There’s also a military veteran? He committed suicide in one of the rooms in like the eighteen hundreds or something, and apparently people sometimes hear the ghostly echo of his gunshot,” Daichi says. “So that’s… yay.”
“Yay,” Oikawa replies, before saying: “Oh, and before anyone comments, Tendou is… handling some personal things right now and was not able to join us. Hopefully we’ll film, like… a dozen videos in Paris - Paris is fucking haunted, you guys - before we have to go, but we’re not sure what he’ll be up to joining us for. Until then, you’ve got the classic duo, just me and my boy here-” Daichi has the air squeezed out of him as Oikawa throws and arm around his shoulders and cinches. “So you know it’s about to get scary as fuck.”]
[Daichi lifts the camera up, focusing on himself. Blurry in the background, the vague shape of Oikawa can be seen talking to what looks like a cop behind him, the flashing blue lights of french police cruisers obscuring him slightly. Based on the darkness, it has to be well past midnight.
“Okay, so… that didn’t go as planned.”]
→ honk: my excitement at having Oikawa and Sawamura back together was very quickly overshadowed WHAT THE FUCK GUYS
→ impetus: ♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡♡ LOVE FROM BERLIN
→ BrambleclawsSidepiece: I love this channel so much it’s not even funny
↳ Kettchup [replying to BrambleclawsSidepiece]: oh my god SAMMMMMEEEEEE
↳ Squirellflightxx [replying to BrambleclawsSidepiece]: do we need to have a conversation???
→ Ziggyzagoon: does anyone know why they’re in Paris??????? Oikawa was posting from a beach in Argentina like 2 days ago???? What the hell??? Surprise world travel IG????
→ LittleManNamedWilf: at what point do we agree that they’re the problem?????????
↳ Litmustestmyass: i thought we agreed about that years ago. The wiki for the ARG says they indirectly cause the nightmares they pursue to become reality
↳ honk [replying to Litmustestmyass]: they say it’s not an ARG literally every single day why are you people so insistent on this
↳ Litmustestmyass [replying to honk]: oh I’m SORRY the alternative is believing in fucking magic????? Yeah I have a job actually so
→ JustFairyThings: day 112 of asking if Paranormality is going to Icon this year
↳ honk [replying to JustFairyThings]: please oh my god that would be incredibleeeeeeeee I just bought my tickets in the presale
→ DemigodUrges: these two should fuck
↳ dynamitee [replying to DemigodUrges]: they both have bfs actually.
↳ dynamitee [replying to DemigodUrges]: and they’ve stated multiple times that their partners are uncomfortable with questions like that
↳ dynamitee [replying to DemigodUrges]: so if you could maybe do that not in the comments of their videos that would be great.
↳ DemigodUrges [replying to dynamitee]: I checked your channel and you’re literally posting scooter reviews???? I’m not gonna take any shit from a fucking scooterer. Go fuck a scooter you bitchass scooter lover
↳ dynamitee [replying to DemigodUrges]: okay well at least I respect my favourite youtubers and the environment. Do you know how good scootering is for you?? I bet you drive a fucking billion pound diesel engine tractor around that’s killing our planet
↳ DemigodUrges [replying to dynamitee]: do you kiss your scooter with that mouth?
→ BigToeFucker: who the hell would have guessed we’d get a reunion for these two before Kodzuken appeared in a video again?? AND WHERE IS KUROO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
---
Excerpt taken from livestream “airport hang” from user @SawamuraD✅
[The camera is shot from a low angle, indicative of Daichi trying to move without his arm being up or in the way, his attention one where he was walking. Hat pulled low over his eyes, blinking against the harsh lighting of the airport, backpack on his shoulders. He apologizes and navigates through the crowd the best he can, getting into a better position before looking back at the phone.
“Okay,” he says. “Sorry. I’m at my gate now. I think this is… hour four of it being delayed? They’ve switched my gate twice. I think they’re conspiring to keep me here.”
He drops his stuff down, sitting in a corner of the airport, his back pressed against glass windows overlooking the tarmac. He looks at his phone for a moment, before reading: “Why are you livestreaming in an airport? Because I’ve been here for four hours and I’m bored out of my mind. It’s like three am in Japan, all my friends went to bed. Also Kenma gets mad when I miss social media updates, and I think I was supposed to livestream on Sunday and I didn’t. For. Reasons.”
He pauses to read the chat again, eventually catching: “You’re the sketchiest celebrity I know - close, I’m not a celebrity but nice compliment.”
His eyes dart across the list of questions, none of them sparking immediate interest but one coming up far more than the others. So he reads:
“Are you going to Icon this year? Uh… no,” Daichi says, laughing a bit. “I didn’t even know what that was until last year, but it’s not something you can just… go to. Like we could, obviously, go as fans, but everyone’s asking us about meetups and shit, and you need to be invited to go as a creator. We floated the idea of doing it informally, but… I dunno, sorry. Maybe next - oh my god, what emoji is that? Is that a sticker? Why is it so - calm down you freaks!”]
---
“Hey, Ushiwaka!”
Ushijima lifts his head, from where he was lacing up his street shoes after practice, sitting in the gym’s locker room.
“My nephew has been pestering me to ask, but he’s dying to know if you’re going to some kind of convention in the states?”
“Ah,” Ushijima says, before looking away to finish tying his shoes. “Kozume handles itinerary and social media. I would not know.”
“... you wouldn’t know if you’re going to an event?”
“I show up where people ask me to show up.”
“He lives life like he plays volleyball,” one of the other men calls, and there’s a chorus of soft laughter, before the first finishes with:
“A shame. I mean, it’s not like he’s going, he’s twelve, but he’s such a big fan. Thinks it’s the coolest thing that I play with you.”
Ushijima stands up, heading over to his locker and taking his stuff out.
“Because of the videos?”
“Why else?”
“Volleyball.”
“Ah, no. He’s a little geek, he’s not into sports,” the man replies. Ushijima hums an understanding, fiddling around with his bag to pull his thin gold band from its safe pocket, slipping it back onto his left hand. He doesn’t feel anything real change, but there’s a mental weight lifted off having it secured back where it was doing what it needed to do.
“Speaking off,” the man adds. “He’s a huge fan, of you guys. His birthday’s coming up, though, and I told him I’d ask - do you think you could that friend of yours to, like, record him a birthday message or something?”
Ushijima stares at him, before saying: “I don’t know who you’re talking about. I am lucky to have many friends, most of which are enjoying some level of celebrity.”
“Oh, ah… the… whatever his name is. The frontman, the guy. Normal looking little dude.”
“Ah, Sawamura,” Ushijima says. “I can ask.”
The man slaps him on the back, quite aggressively. “Thanks, man. I owe you one.”
Ushijima doesn’t bother replying to that, checking messages on his phone and sending off several to Tendou in response to what looked like about 400 words of text messages that had come in over the few hours he was at practice, before shutting his locker and throwing his bag over his shoulder.
“Hey, did you hear?” one of the other guys is saying, gossip not for Ushijima specifically, but between two guys sitting on the bench that catches the attention of several of the athletes. “I heard coach say they were looking at arranging a contract with that prodigy setter, Kageyama. Wouldn’t that be something?”
Ushijima stares at them for a bit, tries to decide if he needs to say something, then decides that’s a problem for another day, and leaves.
---
“Come on, finish the set! Quicker, I know you got more steam left than that! Come on!”
Daichi tries not to over-adjust the way his hands are holding the pull up bar, hauling himself up again and focusing on keeping his form in perfect shape. He was above standard in almost all ways, compared to a normal human’s ability, but Iwaizumi could still smack him for breaking form. And he would, repeatedly, with great joy.
“Oh, from the way you’re acting you’d think you’re just any old guy!”
“I’m not even saying anything,” Daichi huffs back, dropping slowly from the pull-up to repeat it again. And again, and again.
And again.
When they do finish, a work-out session that leaves neither of them satisfied, Iwaizumi compulsively meddles with his notebooks and his tracking apps, grilling Daichi on his diet (normal) and caffeine intake (high) and then he fucks off for a minute to grumble at his phone.
Daichi cleans up, checks his messages, and then when Iwaizumi is thoroughly ruffled they leave the gym together.
“I just don’t understand,” Iwaizumi says, flicking through the notes app on his phone. “It’s been almost twelve months of this, and you’re not gaining any muscle. Your weight doesn’t even fluctuate any real amount. Just normal deviation month to month.”
“I don’t know what to tell you,” Daichi replies, taking a bite from an apple as they wander down the street.
“You eat like you’re ten different grown men, but you haven’t gained any muscle mass. You’re actually not that strong, all things considered, Bo and Ushi both lift more than you, but you can do body-weight exercises seemingly indefinitely, it takes… two hours for you to even break a sweat.”
“Yep,” Daichi says, “Oksana says pretty much the same. I’d probably need to spend years in Shima Three to scratch the surface on what my body is doing.”
Iwa huffs. “Well… I’m not sure what I can do for you. Maybe we jack up your protein intake? See if we can outpace the speed your body equalizes?”
“Maybe,” Daichi says. “Why, though?”
“Because there’s no way your alien DNA just peaked with no other level to rise to. You’re still young, there must be a cap for your abilities, your strength and your stamina, but like any athlete, there’s always more. And the fact that there’s… the fact that we can’t even find your current limit, that we don’t even know where to push, is insane. The only way you don’t develop muscle is either not taking in enough calories, or not pushing yourself hard enough. And I can’t even figure out which it is!”
Daichi stares at him for a moment, before breaking into soft laughter, reaching over to pat his back. “I know, I know. And I appreciate you caring so much at all. You really don’t have to.”
Iwa scowls and steps away to avoid being touched, quickening his step slightly. Daichi follows, as they approach the train station at the end of the street. They scan for admittance, hopping up onto the platform and glancing at a clock for the ETA of the next train.
“Hey,” Iwa starts to say, and his tone has shifted significantly. It’s not that… uncomfortable, ‘I’m about to say something incredibly personal’ tone that set Daichi on edge. But before he can say anything, his phone starts ringing, and Daichi has to check to make sure it’s not an emergency.
“Suga,” Daichi says.
“Answer,” Iwa replies, and Daichi turns away to do just that, lifting the phone up and pressing it to his ear.
“Hey Angel,” he sings. “What’s up?”
“Where are you?”
“Uh… at the train station. Me and Iwa just left the gym.”
“You were at the gym for six hours? Damn, he’s keeping you on an intense routine.”
This makes Daichi laugh, glancing over his shoulder to make sure Iwa was thoroughly occupied looking at the wall before saying: “Yeah, well… You know how he is. He doesn’t have Oikawa around to micromanage, so he needs someone to be his pet.”
“That’s funny, because you’re also Oikawa’s pet when he’s around.”
“Yep,” Daichi says. “Did you need something?”
“Not really. Just wondering where you were - you left and just never came back.”
“We spent longer running than I expected to,” Daichi replies dryly.
“Well that sounds like your fault.”
The sound of the train hissing into the station fills the air. Daichi glances at it, then says: “Hey, sorry, train’s here. I’ll be home soon, okay?”
“Bring dinner on your way!”
“Okay!”
Daichi hangs up, turning around to jog over and catch up with Iwa just in time to muscle his way onto a standing-room-only train cart, muttering under his breath as he presses in between a cold metal pole and Iwa’s shoulder.
“You were going to say something?” Daichi asks.
“Not important,” Iwa replies, and they both stumble as the train leaves the station.
---
Daichi has one bag over his arm, the other hand holding his phone, locked in on it. He shuts the door behind him, and probably should have known better to be paying attention, because he’s functionally jumped the moment he steps inside.
Suga presses him back against the door, one hand pushing to force him to drop the take-out, the other grabbing his phone and banishing it to the shoe rack to be lost for the next day.
“Any unwanted visitors?” Suga says, though he’s barely waiting for an answer.
“No, not right now-” Daichi starts, and then Suga is kissing him, slow and sweet. He’s helpless against it, wrapping his arms around him in return and giving him anything he wanted. It takes him a while - Suga kisses like he’ll never get to again, something Daichi had his suspicions on the root of, but had no complaints to levy for. When he does pull back, it’s enough time for Daichi to mumble:
“I thought you were hungry?”
“I am,” Suga says, grabbing his shirt and pulling him further into the apartment. “But Kuroo and Kenma went out for dinner and if we eat now they’ll be back before I can put that stamina of yours to good use so-”
“I see your priorities are still in line,” Daichi teases, but doesn’t make Suga keep dragging him backwards, stopping to wrap his arms around his hips and lift him up. Suga needs absolutely no second prompting to wrap his legs around him in return, chuckling softly as some kind of confirmation before they’re kissing again.
---
“You know, when you had invited me out to dinner I had imagined something a little more…”
“A little more what?” Kuroo responds, brow furrowed.
Kenma opens his mouth, hesitating to reply as his attention slides over to Bokuto standing eagerly at Kuroo’s shoulder, chewing on the hot dog he’d gotten out of the food court. Behind him, Akaashi finishes paying for his drink, and is seeming to suffer through a badly designed lid he can’t get a paper straw into.
A little more not a food truck, a little less Bokuto and Akaashi, a little more…
Kenma isn’t sure, at this point, what he even expects from Kuroo.
Do you know when you’re a teenager, and you have all these fantasies in your head about how adult life is supposed to go? Kenma hadn’t had any foolish over-expectations for his life, but he had assumed that the distance between him and Kuroo had been borne mostly by the age gap and looming, separate, graduations.
But he’s been out of school for a year now - going on two. He’d moved in with him, Daichi and Suga had even agreed to move apartments to find one that could accommodate the third bedroom. Kenma had been trapped, banging on the metaphorical wall screaming that sharing a room would have been fine, should have been fine, has always been fine.
No, no, no matter what stupid fantasies he had had in his head about graduating and being able to join Kuroo in the city, Kenma had found himself sorely disappointed by how little anything had changed. Maybe Kuroo just wasn’t into him like that. Maybe it was all entirely in his own head even though he failed to see how that could possibly be the case.
Take matters into his own hands? No, impossible. That wasn’t Kenma’s style, exactly. He had hoped, instead, to skirt around the issue and devise a way to trick Kuroo into admitted he wanted more. After all, they were now two adults out in the big city, it was lonely and cold and oh, what would they do without their parents supervising them anymore?
“Maow?”
Kenma looks down to his feet, at where the demon cat was looking up at him from where it wove between Kuroo’s legs.
He supposed he couldn’t actually be mad. If the trade off for not getting Kuroo to make a move on him was being a celebrity streamer, he’s not entirely sure if he wouldn’t have agreed to it ahead of time. No real job, access to some of his idols? Daichi and Oikawa might be itchy and weird about the fame and fortune of it all, but not Kenma.
No, Kenma was more than happy to take advantage of everything this dream come true came with. Save for, of course, the monsters.
He could have done without the monsters.
“Hey, if you’re not happy with the hot dogs there’s also a Mexican truck just down the road,” Kuroo says, pointing vaguely off.
“This is fine,” Kenma replies, as diplomatically as he can.
“This is the best hot dog I’ve ever had,” Bokuto says, at the same time Akaashi comes up on his side, having given up his fight with the straw and now drinking from the cup sans lid. Bokuto shifts as he sees him, grinning an wrapping an arm around his shoulders.
Akaashi, also a victim of a crush on a boy a year older than them, had had no similar delays in hooking up post graduation. He was now settled quite happily into domestic bliss (Plus Ushijima still sharing their apartment), his long-term school plans and an internship. He had also, on several occasions, been invited onto their channel, either to help film, help plan, or be on camera so he could get in on the rapidly growing paycheque the channel provided. He had refused, resolutely, every time. At first Kenma assumed he was camera shy - since he was camera shy - but further interrogating had provided a specific note of Akaashi-typical wisdom that had gone over all their heads.
“You said the monsters can only hurt you if you intentionally seek them out, correct? Right… well I think I’ll not do that, then.”
It was an answer that implied neither belief nor disbelief, but a staunch pragmatism that protected him either way. Simply do not participate in the game if you’re not willing to lose.
“Maooow.”
Kenma looks down to the cat again, who had stretched up and was pawing at Kuroo’s leg, now. Kuroo, distracted by the little guy, tries to feed him a chunk of hot dog.
“That’s not good for-”
The cat swallows it, and then immediately begins clawing at Kuroo’s pants.
“Dude, what is wrong with you?” Kuroo laughs, as the cat meows again and drops down, weaving around and popping up on his other side, nudging as if trying to get into his pocket.
Akaashi hums, watching the cat for a moment, before saying: “Is that the cursed cat?”
“He’s not cursed,” Kuroo defends, wincing as claws enter his leg. “He’s technically a good luck charm. He’s a nice kitty.”
“Well why’s he acting that way?”
“I don’t know-” Kuroo mutters, handing his half consumed hot dog over to Kenma - now the proud holder of two half consumed hot dogs - and bending down to pick the cat up. He holds him against his chest, and the cat immediately braces itself to look back at him.
“Maow!”
“What?” Kuroo replies. “Is Daichi stuck down a well?”
If a cat could frown, this cat is frowning.
Whap.
Kuroo gets a face full of paws, so he mutters and lets the cat loose onto the ground.
“I dunno,” he says, over to Akaashi. “Usually if something evil is about to happen, he’d do his little paw waving thing. You know, like the maneki-nekos do in the window?”
As if Akaashi was a dumbass, he begins to demonstrate the paw wave.
Akaashi watches his hand bob for a second, judgementally.
The cat - dubbed Lucky, by Kuroo - watches Kuroo’s hand bob judgementally.
Kenma shakes his head.
“No, dude, it’s more like this you have to keep your arms close to your chest,” Bokuto says, and now they’re both doing a stupid cat wave.
“I think I know how to do a cat impression,” Kuroo snipes back, doubling down on his efforts.
Kenma’s attention drifts down to Lucky, who’s now looking up at Kenma, very much conveying a get a load of this bullshit type of energy.
Lucky-the-cat turns and wanders away, evidently bored of their hijinks.
“Alright, Bo,” Akaashi says, louder, to stop what was happening from happening. “Should we maybe get walking? It’s a bit of a way to the train station, and the lights are already on.”
“Ah, but where’s the fun in that, the night is still young!” Bokuto says, pulling Akaashi in by the shoulders and squeezing him tightly. “Let’s go get gelato!”
“We’re still eating dinner.”
“And that means we can’t get gelato?”
Akaashi chuckles, somehow amused by this buffoon, and Kenma’s attention is caught by someone coming down the street towards them. He pays attention only because he expects the pedestrian to want access down the street, and they were being rather obstructive, so he intends to dash out of the way and hide behind Kuroo in case pleasant passer-by smalltalk is about to occur, but he stops when he recognizes the figure.
Oh?
He tugs on Kuroo’s sleeve to get his attention, and Kuroo perks up as well as he recognizes who was walking towards them.
“Fukunaga!” Kuroo says, breaking into an easy grin as he lifts a hand to wave. Fukunaga, hands tucked tight into the pockets of a long coat, gives him a smile and a nod as he approached. “What the hell are you doing in Tokyo?”
“Got a gig in a bar,” Fukunaga says, his voice seeming a little hoarse, like he was still clearing it of something.
“Like a job bartending or a gig as a performer?” Bokuto asks, head tilting to the side.
“Wouldn’t you like to know,” Fukunaga replies, before poking at Kuroo’s shoulder. “I set you a message, kittycat. Check your phone more often.”
“I didn’t hear my phone go off,” Kuroo says, reaching into his pocket.
“It was an email.”
“You sent me an email?” Kuroo says, baffled by this choice. “Why the fuck are you emailling people, buddy?”
Fukunaga’s nose twitches, and he glances over to Kenma. “Hallo,” he says. “Long time no see.”
“Long time no see,” Kenma says, awkwardly, since he’s 100% sure that it’s his fault the last few attempts Fukunaga has made to socialize have been ignored.
“I have a message from you that came in… a minute ago,” Kuroo says. “You sent me an email a minute before walking up to me?” he clarifies, looking up at Fukunaga. The other just looks back at him with wide eyes, shrugging.
“I’m funnier in person,” Fukunaga says, before giving them both a grin. “Anyway I’m going to be late, you should check your phone more often. Toodles~”
Fukunaga brushes past them both, seemingly off to do whatever the fuck that guy did day-to-day, and Kenma crosses his arms.
“He’s a weirdo,” Kenma says. “And I know, I know what you’re going to say, that’s rich coming from me. From us. From the kings of weird. But he is a weirdo, like, statistically above average-”
“Holy shit,” Kuroo says, staring at his phone.
“What is it?” Bokuto replies, immediately leaning in to try and see the screen.
Akaashi shifts his weight as if preparing to ditch if anything even remotely paranormal comes out of Kuroo’s mouth.
“Well… I dunno, I just flipped over to the business account to check, because Fukunaga was getting on my case about it, and… We have an email sitting here from the coordinators at Icon. It came in this afternoon.”
Kenma feels his entire body heat up. Kuroo looks at him, and he realizes he is physically tensing, hands raising in response.
He grabs Kuroo by the jacket.
“We’ve had an email from Internet Icon since this afternoon and we didn’t fucking know?” he screeches.
---
The door slams open, so hard it might have actually damaged the wall. So much for their deposit. Across the apartment, on the couch, Daichi and Suga are trying to enjoy what looks like a very nice, normal dinner of Chinese food. When the door opens with a fury, Daichi begins to choke on lo mein, and Suga shrieks, drawing himself up as if preparing to escape.
“This!” Suga shouts, pointing aggressively at Kuroo and Kenma as they come barrelling in, followed just a step behind by Bokuto and a dragged along Akaashi. “This kind of entrance with surprise guests, this is the exact reason I have my priorities set as I do.”
Daichi is genuinely, actually choking.
“We got invited to Icon!” Kenma shouts, bullying his way to the front of the group in a hurry, all his usual introvertedness gone like it never existed. “We actually got invited to Icon - like, the channel itself, they’re going to give us creator badges and let us into the secret creator places and there’s a list of like a dozen different panels and events they’re offering participation for and we can pick whatever we want and they’re going to - are you two even listening to me?” Kenma shouts, even though there is nothing to indicate either of them weren’t. Well, Suga was listening. Daichi was more concerned with coughing.
“I’m listening!” Suga says, giving him a grin. “That sounds… exciting. That’s the thing the internet has been pestering you about for the last few months, right?”
“That doesn’t matter, I don’t care about the fans,” Kenma says.
“Okay, well-” Kuroo tries to step in, but Kenma swats him away.
“Do you not understand how big this is? Everyone is going to be there, this is like… this is like getting invited to fucking Eurovision as a musician, this is the convention. Nothing even comes close! Everyone. Every internet star is going!”
Daichi manages to clear his airways, coughing again and sucking in a breath.
“You people are lucky I don’t need air as frequently as a normal person,” Daichi spits. “Five of you in the room and not an ounce of concern for me?”
“We’re dealing with something more important than that!” Kenma says.
“More important than me breathing?” Daichi says.
“Your freaky alien shit happens every day! This only happens once a year, come on!” Kenma snaps back, smacking his hands together. “Why aren’t you more excited?”
“Freaky alien shit?” Akaashi echoes, glancing at Bokuto.
“Oh,” Bokuto says. “So Daichi’s technically not entirely human, his mother-”
Akaashi puts a hand up to stop him. “Nope, nevermind, goodbye,” he says, turning to head to the door. “Happy for you guys! See you at home, Bo.”
Bokuto makes a whining noise as he leaves, but the rest of the room is frying bigger fish.
“We have to go,” Kenma says.
“Uh…” Daichi replies, a little bit lost. “I mean… we’ll have to coordinate with Oikawa, in… Argentina, remember - are we all invited?”
“Yes, yes, to Paranormality and the team, we can take anyone we want. We just need… to pay for hotel costs, and flight costs… and… a couple of other things but they’re giving us access to their creator floors at the hotel, so that’ll be at a discount, and-”
“Again, we need to coordinate with Oikawa,” Daichi replies.
“No we don’t!” Kenma says, scrambling over to him. “Promise me, Sawamura. Promise me that even if Oikawa hates it and doesn’t want to go, we still say yes. The offer only works if at least some of the on-camera people go to some of the panels as featured creators so you need to pick something and go you cannot take this away from me-”
“Okay,” Kuroo says, stepping in to stop Kenma from doing what seemed like a strangulation attempt on Daichi, pushing him to the side. “I think he gets it.”
“I do,” Daichi says. “And… I mean… Yeah, I’m into it, but…”
He glances over at Suga.
Suga seems to be fence sitting, giving him a useless shrug. “I dunno. You don’t handle crowds and people and questions all that well. Plus isn’t this event international, where’s it hosted?”
“California,” Kenma says, before snapping his fingers. “Ushijima’s father is there. I’ll use that to bribe him into agreeing to go.”
“California…” Suga muses.
“Why is this even a debate?” Kenma says. “Don’t we vote on everything? Put it to a vote I hate you people-”
“Okay, okay, no, Kenma, calm down,” Daichi says, laughing slightly and waving a hand at him. “We’ll go. Obviously we’ll go, people have been wanting to see us there. It’s a great-”
“Oh, fuck yes,” Kenma says, turning around and energetically high-fiving Kuroo. Mission accomplished, he seems to immediately lose energy, waving at them. “I’ll send you the itinerary, pick what you’ll agree to do. I think part of the deal to be a featured creator requires you to do at least one meet and greet and post about it on social media but I’ll handle that.”
“Huh?” Daichi says, but Kenma heads down to his room. “Where-”
“I have to reply to that email before they retract the offer!”
“Okay!” Daichi shouts, watching him go before glancing up at Kuroo. “Is he good?”
“I think this is the best day of his life, actually,” Kuroo replies, before saying: “And don’t worry, even if things get a little crazy, we’ve got your back. You’re not the only on-camera personality that can manage the events.”
“No, but he is one of only two that got verified on social media,” Suga mutters.
“You shut your trap,” Kuroo spits.
---
“Kenma sent me the map for this convention centre,” Daichi says, yawning as he looks over the harsh light from the computer screen, scanning over the digital map. “I’ve seen city plans that are less complicated than this, this event is… massive. Like… bigger than massive.”
“I know,” Oikawa replies. Daichi pretends not to be jealous of the sunny South American sun bleeding through his computer screen as Oikawa takes the video call out on his front porch, basking in the daylight. “I’ve had my eye on it for a while.”
“You’ve had your-” Daichi pauses, pinching the bridge of his nose and trying to stave off an exhaustion headache. “Did you manifest this?”
“Not intentionally,” Oikawa says, shrugging. “Honestly. But… you know, there’s a lot of cool stuff in the U.S.”
“Cool stuff? Like what?” Daichi says.
“Like a… statistically irregular number of reported UFO sightings and alien abductions,” Oikawa says.
Daichi frowns, pulling back from the map to maximize Oikawa’s video call screen.
“And you want to go…?”
“Well of course I want to go,” Oikawa says.
Daichi stares at him for a moment, before leaning back on the couch, looking down the hall to the closed doors, to where Suga was sleeping peacefully, Kuroo and Kenma both tucked away. Silence in the darkness.
He focuses on Oikawa’s face in in his computer screen.
“What’s your interest in aliens nowadays anyway?” Daichi says. “When we met, our first investigation, you… you were under a different impression. Of yourself, of what aliens were. But that’s over. We know the truth, more or less. What does finding them do for you now?”
Oikawa stares back at him, something that almost seems like a smile crinkling in the corners of his eye, though it doesn’t reach his lips. He sits away from the screen, after a moment, to lift a blue mug up and take a sip from it.
“You’re very humble,” Oikawa says, before giving him a less authentic smile. “You, dumbass.”
“Me?”
“Yeah.”
“But we know about me. Or, at least, the most that we can,” Daichi says. “Living proof of aliens.”
Oikawa shakes his head slightly. “No, not like that. I mean… We don’t know why. And because we don’t know why, we don’t know… to what end. There’s a chance that you, and Oksana, and all the alien hybrids are just… left over experimental waste, that don’t mean anything. But there’s also a chance that whatever they did to you was done for a purpose, and a purpose that might end up hurting you. If they… came back to get you, or activated something inside of you. And… I think maybe it’s just part of who I am. Believer or just… a friend, but I consider you mine now, so it’s my responsibility to guard you against what outsiders might do.”
“And you think California is going to have answers?”
“Maybe not Cali,” Oikawa says. “Maybe nowhere. But something in me says if you want to figure out what Aliens are doing to this planet… go to the place they’re doing it the most.”
Daichi nods, before saying: “Okay.”
“Okay? Just like that?”
“I trust you,” Daichi says. “To every end. So… yeah. Okay. But… let’s… maybe not mention it to the others? I don’t want to… well, you know what knowing can do to a person. Might be safer to keep them out for now.”
Oikawa nods. “Agreed. Aw. This almost feels like the good old days.”
“The good old days being when we thought my dad was evil…?”
“Yeah… you know mostly the other stuff.”
Daichi laughs, but Oikawa keeps talking before he can comment.
“But, you know, while we’re there, I’ve got this list of haunted locations, folktales… We can go to this convention, and then just… take a few weeks, hit the major sites, it would probably do numbers on our channel, dude. Good excuse to the other guys as to why we’re looking into certain things too.”
“Wait, you want to- what?” Daichi says.
“Hit a few famous locations, maybe a few collaborations - think about it this way. If we ghost bust every goddamn place in that country, hit like four locations a week for three weeks, we’ll have so many backlogged videos we’ll be able to come home and take two months of vacation without missing a single weekly upload.”
“Oh, god, that does sound nice,” Daichi says. “Lots of work, though.”
“Not a lot of work - lots of work for Kenma and Kuroo editing, maybe, but not for us.”
“I help with editing,” Daichi complains.
“Is that what you call it?”
Daichi mocks throwing one of the couch pillows at him, huffing.
“Okay, let’s pitch that idea to the gang, but only if they’re down for it. Suga and Iwa and Kuroo still have school, Bo and Ushijima their team obligations… I think Ushijima is still digging himself out of shit from his Parisian nightmare.”
“Well, we don’t need everyone to film every day, if some people need to come home early, that’s fine,” Oikawa says. “Me, my team loves me. I’ll get whatever time off I need.”
“Smug fucking bastard,” Daichi says, before yawning again.
“If you’re tired, you can go,” Oikawa says. You don’t need to sit with me all lunch.”
“No, no, I’m fine,” Daichi mutters. “I just haven’t been sleeping well this week. But I want to go through these event options, confirm us for a few of them… fuck, the ARG rumours are getting out of control, half the panels are about writing horror, or making horror videos.”
“Are we horror youtubers?”
“Well we aren’t fucking minecrafters.”
---
ALIEN AMERICANA - [noun]; are you sure you want to know, Daichi?